Cannes 2012 comes with side of pavlova

Dominik is best-known for his debut feature which he also wrote, Chopper, and wrote and directed The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. He also adapted The Killer Inside Me from Jim Thompson’s novel and was supposed to direct, but left the project. It was eventually directed by Michael Winterbottom and nominated for Berlin’s Golden Bear but ended up winning only a Razzie.

The remainder of the Cannes competition line-up is peppered with returning visitors, including Michael Haneke, Hong Sang-soo, Im Sang-soo, Ken Loach and David Cronenberg (whose son Brandon also gets a nod with his debut feature Anti-Viral selected for Un Certain Regard).

In what’s probably his last try, 90-year old local boy Alain Resnais has a fifth shot at a Palme d’Or in a run that spans 62 years since his 1959 nomination for Hiroshima Mon Amour. His last selection, 2009’s Wild Grass, didn’t win, but the jury took no chances and presented Resnais a lifetime achievement gong.

Un Certain Regard by contrast includes four debut features in its competition line-up alongside better-known and returning directors including China’s Lou Ye, who keeps up his record of triennial Cannes selection. Mystery is his first appearance in the sidebar, although Suzhou River, Summer Palace and Purple Butterfly all competed for the Palme d’Or. Mystery also his first mainland film for six years, having been banned from filmmaking in China following the sexually-explicit and “politically irresponsible” Summer Palace.

Cannes offers special screenings to a variety of artsy fare, including from 2010 winner Apichatpong Weerasethakul. Following the 118 minutes (though it felt far longer) of Uncle Boonme, Mekong Hotel comes in at a merciful 61 minutes.

Numbing the other end will be an extended cut of Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in America. A film that could make Peter Jackson’s recent works seem like shorts, the redux version extends the original 229 minutes to 269, or four and a half hours.

Another previous Palme d’Or nominee, Bernado Bertolucci (Last Tango in Paris, The Last Emperor) gets a special screening of Io E Te (Me and You). For the less artistically inclined, Madagascar 3 also gets a special screening.